Powder Keg in a Prison Cell
by CodenameMeretricious
Summary: Three years after Reichenbach, Sherlock is ready to come home. Based on the song "I Can Barely Say" by The Fray


I'm not as much of a machine as you'd like to think, John Watson. Sentiment. Yes, I feel it too.

I don't know how I survived the first 34 years of my life without you. I don't remember it being this difficult. But it must have been. How could it not? What did I do before you came along, joined me at crime scenes, at heinous meetings with Mycroft, at everything?

I can feel it all slipping now. Something's not right. It's all off kilter, sliding around like a bar of soap your wet fingers just can't quite grasp. See? I'm using similes. That's how desperate I am for some form of variation. For something else, anything to distract me from the boredom. The waiting. The wanting.

This room is nothing. Barely an attic. It's dark. It's empty. My chair isn't here. My violin is gone. There is no fridge. No microscope for experiments. Mycroft only allowed me a laptop after he'd had his people thoroughly check it for any kind of bugs and insured no one could trace it. He made me swear not to contact you. I'm not sure what would happen if I did.

I haven't spent much of the past three years here. I've been chasing, tracking, hunting. But I've been here long enough. For weeks now. I have catalogued every last splinter in the mildew-covered boards of the floor and measured the sound of the cheap, creaky mattress to a centigram. I have counted the threads of my coat. I have tried to remember the number of times you touched me.

There's nothing left for me to do here but think. I didn't realize it before, but I do my best thinking when you're there. Anderson and the rest of Lestrade's idiots make the job tedious and their idiocy generally permeates into my thinking, but you never got in the way. You never inhibited my deductions.

You always thought I explained my reasoning. That I made it all clear, laid it out for you to understand, or at least appreciate. I usually did. At least enough for Lestrade to pick up. As long as they caught the right criminal it all worked out in the end. But you seemed to appreciate the how. The way I reached the painfully obvious conclusion. I usually told you. This time I didn't. And look what it's done.

I'm stuck now. Hidden away as though the world is a better place without me in it. Perhaps it is. It's hard to say. It's hard to say much of anything anymore. It's been long. So, so long since I went away. I didn't want to. Didn't want to leave the work, leave 221B, leave you. I'm about to implode. I'm not sure I can take it. The sitting still. The waiting. I found them all, you know. Except Moran. I think I might need your help for that one. But I can't go to you. Not yet. The timing isn't right. Damn Mycroft and his timing. I'm not his pawn, but I've got no choice. I'm stuck here. A powder keg in a prison cell. You would understand. You would see me cracking.

The laptop whirrs, still trying to trace the tracker one of my network planted on Moran. I've only seen him once, but he was gone before I could get him. The signal fails. He's dropped me again. You would help. You would know what to do. To find Moran. To stop the ache of stagnation in my skull. Hunting down Moriarty's network occupied me for a while. Not long enough, though. It's just Moran now. If I find Moran I can come home. I can…I just need time.

Give me time. Give me strength. Give me you.

On the rare occasions I'm let out, I check on you. I shouldn't, I know. If you catch sight of me you might faint with the shock. But then again, you were a soldier. Perhaps you're stronger than that. You were always stronger than I gave you credit for. And I was always weaker than you believed. I've let you down.

I see you with Mary and she seems happy—of course she is, she's got you. But are you happy? You smile a lot. But you don't look…God, I didn't mean for it to take three years. It was never supposed to be this long, but Moran…the slick bastard must have learned everything Moriarty knew. I wonder if he planned it, planned for Moran to take over. He thought it was funny, getting his own ex-military partner.

Partner. An apt description. We were partners. Not the way people thought we were, but in almost every other sense of the word.

I miss you. I thought I would be above it all. Thought I could remove myself from feeling. It wouldn't be the first time I've been wrong, though it does sting more than the Baskerville case. Perhaps because there's more at stake, more to be lost in being so wrong.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss your mumbled admirations. You really did think I was a genius. I know you still believe me. I still miss the fact that you always made me tea. You never asked, didn't even assume, you just made it. Whether I drank it or not, you set the cup by my elbow and walked away. I didn't drink it, mostly. Waste of time, not enough caffeine. But you never stopped. That was nice.

I don't even get tea here. No way to heat it. I eat on occasion. Usually when I think of you. Which is often, really. Molly made me eat, that first month. It was miserable. She didn't know what to do, she just kept hovering, buzzing around and making noise. She wouldn't let me just think. She wouldn't leave tea at my elbow. She'd force me to take it, practically tug my hands away from the computer, away from one of the new phones. People do stupid things when they are trying to be helpful.

You never did stupid things.

Except trust me.

One of the phones buzzes. Maybe they've found him. If they've found him, I can find you. But do you want me to? Would it be too much to ask? To simply come home and find you waiting, wondering why I haven't bought the milk?

I promise, I'd buy the milk now. I'd do anything.

He might be in Zurich. No, Belgium. There are only three flights in the next 6 hours; I need to know quickly. I wonder if you would come with me if I asked. You always came with me.

Sentiment is heavy. I don't like the feeling. I've had too much of it lately, it's all but anchored me to this room, dragging at my feet each time I take a step. I can only take twelve steps here. With the bed and the small table, the walls are so close.

Mycroft calls. He's not in Zurich. Not in Blegium.

I'm not sure what happens now. I didn't think this far ahead. You were in danger; I jumped. Of all the cases we've solved, of all the puzzles I've spent hours figuring out, this was the simplest one. I jump or you die. Elementary stuff. I know you would have done the same. Perhaps that's why it hurts. Because you would have jumped without question, without a way to survive. You would have discovered the snipers, watched Moriarty die, and leapt. You wouldn't have even had a plan. I don't think you ever had a plan. You just followed me, trusting I wouldn't lead you astray. I failed you more times than I care to admit, but you never said a word.

This was my biggest failing.

Because I know you wanted to go with me. You begged me to wait, to stay put so you could join me. Join me in leaving the roof down through the door, or join me on the pavement. I can't say if there would have been much difference to you.

And I know it wasn't love. That stupid, petty emotion. Sure, it moves mountains and brings joy and it's all you really need, but I don't think it was that. At least not in the sense that countless poems and stories and songs have gushed about. But perhaps it was some variation. Some form of the emotion. Silly, these emotions; what they make us do.

Your own emotions have made you fail on numerous occasions. It's what got you shot. The intrepid soldier. Of course we wouldn't be here if it weren't for my own failings. My own inability to control those impulses, to fight the dreaded mix of chemicals that reduces men to crumbling, quivering masses, void of all logical thought. I would have been able to outwit Moriarty. He wouldn't have lauded your life over my head, he couldn't have backed me into the corner that he did. And you wouldn't be…sad.

You're not alone, Mary takes care of you and Lestrade and Stamford call when they can. Mrs. Hudson even wanted you to stay at the flat so she could keep an eye on you. But you're still alone. I think. I can't tell from a distance. I don't like being this far away. You're harder to read. I need you closer, in the same flat, in the same room, right next to me.

It's despicable, but I need you.

Damn it all, I do. Not in a romantic way. Not in any sexual, amorous sense. I just…need you. And I don't know why and I don't like it. This feeling of not knowing, of letting someone down. I've never had someone to let down before. It's not a feeling I enjoy. Neither is the waiting.

I'm in a constant state of flux, a state I don't naturally appreciate. I want to go back. More than I've wanted anything. More than I wanted the cocaine, the nicotine patches. You're a drug. A tired cliché, I know, but I finally understand what it means. You're addicting. And not a habit I can easily break.

I didn't realize what I wanted until now. I've had more than enough time to suss it out, to mull over the myriad of things I could possibly want out of this short existence. It's simple really, but I can't quite bring myself to the admission. You would be able to say it. Probably have said it. Not literally, but the sentiment has been expressed. Trust me, I've got it catalogued. My own expressions? The grandest gesture was jumping. And look what that's done.

I've been gone three years exactly come next Thursday. So long I can barely say. And I want nothing more than to return home. To be back at Baker Street, watching you smile as I play the Tchaikovsky piece you like. I'm not sure if you know you do that: smile and sit in your chair to listen, even if you have work or are upset with me. Even if you'd yelled and ranted and raved at some inane piece of social convention I failed to understand or demonstrate, you always sat and listened.

Would you do that now? If I came home? Would you make us tea and sit in your chair and watch me play? Would you go on pretending that nothing had happened? Would you forgive me? You've forgiven me far too much. Even I know that I don't deserve it. But every time I needed you, you stood there at my side. You put up with the comments, the petty thoughts of everyone around us, assuming you would only stay with a sociopath like me if we were shagging, if you were getting something out of it. Were you getting something out of it? I fixed your limp. For a while. You've been using your cane lately. You tell Mary it's the war wound. I think it's a different kind of PTSD. I think I made your limp come back.

I'm sorry, John. I'm so, so sorry. More than I could ever tell you.

Though I could, perhaps, show you. If I found my way home, if I finished Moran, if I fixed this all, would you take me back? Would you accept me? It wouldn't be home without you, but I know I don't deserve it. You'd stay with Mary. She was the one girlfriend I couldn't mess things up with. I couldn't shake her. But I wouldn't have tried. She's good for you. Better than me, no doubt. What am I to you? You deserve to be happy, to settle down with the woman you love. You deserve a family. I couldn't give you that. I wouldn't have given you much of anything. Now I suppose I've given you all. Not that it was much, not that there was much of me to give. This transport. It's no good to anybody. Not even me.

And now I'm caged here. Stuck in this wretched place with no air, no space, nothing to do but wait for a sighting. Wait to initiate one of the thirty-five plans I've crafted, only seven of which Mycroft has approved. I don't care though. If it gets rid of Moran, I'll do it. Anything to keep you safe. I can't jump again. I have to stop him. Any other way. I won't, I can't. This is killing me. I'm not used to this…this pull. This inability to ignore you. To think logically. To only worry about myself. It's…I'm not sure I can handle it. Three years and I'm finally breaking. I just want to run. I just want…

A phone goes off. They've got him. It's Mycroft, he was in Madrid. They took him down. Moran is gone. The very last residual piece of Moriarty's web. Gone in one shot. I don't know how they did it. It took too long, I know. He's gone. Moran is gone. I can come home. I can see you. But can I? Has it been too long? Have I seen too much? Have I turned you against me? I'm so sorry, John. I know, I broke you. I broke too.

But if I go back, if I find you, would you forgive me? Would you leave me? I left you for long enough. I'm so, so sorry.

It's clear. The way is clear. I can leave this place. I can find you. I can't think straight. Can't see straight. Nothing makes sense, it doesn't need to. You. That's all I can think about is you you you you you and me and you.

I hope it's not too late. I hope you'll take me in.

I just want…I just need…please…John.

watch?v=tC6FZ4B0aqE


End file.
